Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Blood On Snow review – Jo Nesbø introduces a hitman with a heart

A killer is employed to take out his boss’s wife in the chart-topping novelist’s pacy thriller. Just don’t expect another Harry Hole

Jo Nesbo, books
Jo Nesbo, whose Blood On Snow is 'noiry and pulpy'. Photograph: Linda Nylind for the Guardian
Olav is a fixer. Usually, he “fixes” people – Jo Nesbø’s new novel opens as he stands over a man he’s shot in the chest and neck, blood dripping on to the snow. And he’s just been asked to fix his crime lord boss’s beautiful, unfaithful wife.

As well as people, though, Olav also fixes stories, giving us an alternative take on Les Misérables, because “the business about stealing bread just annoyed me… So: Jean Valjean was a deadly killer who was wanted throughout France. And he was in love with Fantine, the poor prostitute.” And, the reader increasingly suspects, this not entirely reliable narrator is fixing the narrative of his own life.

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